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n𝗈𝐯𝗅xt.𝗇𝓔t

n“Now, don’t get too arrogant just because you beat me once. Now that I know of your skills, I will win the next time we fight, so how about we test it out? Surely I can get a chance to redeem myself, right?”

nAisa, feeling a bit more confident, continued to smile and returned to her spot on the training ground whilst I picked up my weapon of choice. The feeling of leather gripping in my hand was nice, and as the match started without a countdown, I smiled, waiting once again.

nAisa disappeared into thin air, and then, just like before, the overwhelming feeling of terror and power lunged at me, but now from my left side, opposite to where my spear was. It was a smart decision and worked yet again, but this time, the millisecond was cut in half, and I just barely managed to summon my new weapon in between the single dagger aiming for my throat.

n“Huff… huff… huff… damn, that was close,” I muttered, feeling the blade slightly tickle my skin, drawing just a few drops of blood before disappearing into thin air. Aisa was getting ready to make a new attack, possibly incorporating new skills… but the next time, I could already tell it was going to be long-range.

nVwooomm… BOOOOM

nQuickly, I ducked down. It wasn’t a narrow dodge or anything, as it was obvious what she was going to do. I mean, with her speed, if she wanted to pull off yet another physical attack, it would have been done faster, so it was safe to assume she was going to use that fleshy mass to try and kill me. And well, it seems I was right.

nThe extended barrel of the sniper attached to Aisa’s arm smoked, the bullet of flesh that had ravaged the wall behind me being sucked right back towards it. I easily dodged this as well, causing Aisa to click her tongue with disappointment.

n“Hmmmm… I thought this wouldn’t work. I guess it was worth a shot, though,” Aisa shrugged her shoulders, shortening the barrel to where it looked like an assault rifle and proceeding to bombard me with a flurry of fleshy bullets. They smelled absolutely vial, but what was most dangerous about these things was their firepower because, damn, they were way more powerful than your average bullet.

nUnsummoning my lance and gripping my spear with both hands, I attempted to block the bullets, only to see them blow the blade backward. If I wasn’t anymore careful, I could see easily see my blade unattached from the hinge or just straight up shattering from the flurry of bullets.

nBreath of the Snowy Underworld Innate Calm

nIn a mere millisecond, the entire world around me slowed down. My body had also been slowed down, but to be honest, it didn’t feel like it. My body began to grow faster and faster as I dodged each and every bullet flying toward me. This surprised Aisa until she noticed a trail of icy mist escape my mouth, forming in the shape of a condensation cloud.

nQuickly, she began running towards me, still bombarding me with the fleshy gun, all the way until I stretched out my spear to reach her. A trail of icy mist escaped from the side of her mouth, matching my breathing patterns as she unequipped the disgusting gun and gripped two of these black daggers made from ice. Her grip was extremely hard, to the point I almost felt bad for the inanimate objects as any harder, and they probably would have straight up just cracked or split in half.

nSlowly, it was starting to get fun.

nCLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG

nWe were on equal footing despite our gaps in different stats. Clearly, she had a much higher speed than I while my strength was unequivocally leagues above hers. Sure, her daggers were able to move at such high speeds even this slowed world of mine could barely keep up with it, but my spear, when defending the blades, knocked her arms so far they nearly flew out of their sockets, unhinging from the shoulder.

nFighting speed with strength took an innovative method which, to be honest, was working way too well since she was obviously using more physical stamina while I was using more mental stamina trying to keep up with her attacks, planning my moves ten steps ahead before she even threw out her next slash.

nSparks flew across the training grounds as we occasionally split up, huffing and puffing before clashing straight back in the middle of the dirt arena. There was no exchange of blows as Aisa dodged every attack I tried to slip in, and I blocked every attack Aisa attempted to slip in.

nBut my luck was horrible. A drop of sweat flung from Aisa’s forehead and stitched itself into my eye, causing me to blink a bit harder than normal with my left eye. And somehow, Aisa was able to see this, throwing both of her blades towards this half-a-second blind spot which I blindly threw my spear towards.

nCLANG

n“Huff… huff… huff… Damn… that was close,” I muttered, pushing the handle of my spear away, attempting to take out the daggers which had just barely wormed their way into my flesh. It wasn’t deep, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to bleed.

nAisa, not wanting to contest me in a competition of strength, immediately took out her daggers, causing a burst of blood to fly out of my obliques. Feeling good about herself, she went for my neck, a vital point on my body, but also a spot on me that took just a half a second longer to reach, especially with her physical exhaustion that had been piling up. Finally. It had come. The moment I had been waiting for.

n“Freeze,” I choked out a single word that made my throat immediately begin to gurgle with blood. My throat was on fire for using such a skill against somebody so strong, but at least it was enough time for me to knock the weapons out of Aisa’s hands- huh? They won’t budge. “You persistent bastard.”

nAs I lightly chuckled, I took a few steps back just as soon as her body had unfrozen, allowing her to slash right toward where my carotid artery would have been. Clearly, she had no intent on holding back.

n“Stop holding back. Why’d you back up…? You could have easily ended my life right then and there… but you didn’t. Why?”

n“First of all, this is just a spar, so stop trying to go for the kill. Second of all, stop lying to me. I know you stayed frozen for just a bit longer, waiting for me to slash at your vitals. You knew you couldn’t beat me without taking a substantial amount of damage, so you decided to sacrifice part of your body… you’re strong, I’ll give you that,” I heaved, sucking in as much air as possible. Aisa did the same but tried not to show it as much.

nBreath of the Snowy Underworld took a lot out of you. It was essentially freezing our lungs the entire time we were clashing. I knew we were both looking to try and drain each other’s stamina, which is a reason why both of us didn’t use as many skills as we had hoped to. Maybe just a few buff skills, but besides that, it was a clean fight.

nLittle did Aisa know, I had infinite mana, so her attempt to try and drain my stamina so she could beat me in a contest of mana was impossible in the first place. I had unlimited mana. Nobody can beat me in that kind of competition.

nThere was also the matter of our Throne Worlds. Sure, we could have easily activated them, but it was such an unnecessary expense, espeiaclly with the after effects to our body, that it wasn’t worth it for just a mere spar… although, Aisa didn’t seem like the type to hold back during a spar, so maybe she didn’t activate hers for a different reason.

n“Let’s end it here,” Aisa sighed, rubbing the back of her head as she coughed out a few last puffs of icy breath. “I see no point in continuing, plus… I’m so **ing tired,” She laughed, flopping back onto the ground while I walked over to her. I then proceeded to sit next to her, smiling as we regained our stamina.

n“You know, I’ve been thinking. Will I change just like Cy if I meet my demon lord? Do you think he will do something so rigorous that I’ll end up like Cy… I heard Leviathen is even worse and crueler than Beezlebub, so I’m scared I’ll lose myself.”

n“You want me to be honest?” I looked down at the girl, who just shrugged. “You probably will change, but how your personality changes is up to you. I don’t know… just… try not to lose yourself, I guess.”

n“You’re horrible at comforting people,” Aisa laughed, and as I saw her smile, I smiled as well.

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